Preventing Genocide

A journalist, activist, and researcher for Memorial, Usam Baysaev was a close friend of Natasha Estemirova. In "Too Soon, Again", an article for The New Republic, Baysaev mourns his friend's death. After a decade of putting herself at great risk to defend human rights in Chechnya, Estemirova was kidnapped and murdered on July 15, 2009. Baysaev writes:

I met Natasha toward the end of 1999, at the height of the battles in Chechnya. The Russian military was eager to occupy as many towns and villages as possible, without regard to the methods used to achieve this goal, or the number of civilians that would be killed. The region sank into a swamp of blood; there was information daily about the targeting of civilians, killings, reprisals, repressions.

I worked for Human Rights Watch and helped its staff to collect information. I gathered testimonials from refugees in Ingushetia who had fled the war in Chechnya. I couldn't go into Chechnya myself; it was too dangerous for a young man to cross Russian checkpoints in the direction opposite to the flow of refugees. If a Chechen man tried to go into Chechnya, he would be suspected of being a fighter, and at minimum detained. And, once detained, then quite likely to disappear without trace.

The only ones who could risk going in and out of the warring republic were women. For this reason, in the first, hardest, and bloodiest months of the war, the work of Memorial, a Russian human rights organization best known for extensively documenting abuses during and after the two Chechen wars, was built exclusively on women's personal heroism--their willingness to risk their lives on a daily basis…

Natasha demanded a very cautious treatment of testimonies. She thought that sometimes, it was better not to publicize the facts, at least not right away… Only in very unique situations, when it was necessary to save a life or preserve the person's health, only then would she summon her courage and reveal her source...

A few days ago, the friends and colleagues of Natasha Estemirova, and those whom she had helped, carried her coffin down Victory Boulevard in Grozny, past tacky signs with Putin's name. After that, we held a meeting of Memorial staff, including our colleagues from Moscow, where all the Chechens insisted that we wanted to continue working. The work of the Memorial office in Grozny is only temporarily suspended. After we mourn Natasha and think through strategies and logistics, we shall resume. In that continued effort, there might be some small victory for Natasha.

On July 30, the Museum updated its Google Earth initiative Crisis in Darfur with the latest U.S. Department of State data that sheds new light on the extent of the genocide in Darfur.

The new data shows that more than 3,300 villages have been damaged or destroyed, primarily between 2003-2005, in the Darfur region of Sudan. This is more than twice the number that was identified in previous U.S. government assessments and strengthens the evidence of a vast, targeted campaign of destruction against civilians.

This is the most detailed picture to date of the scope and nature of the destruction that occurred during the genocide in Darfur and after. That thousands of villages were destroyed has been known for some time; this data documents the true enormity of the destruction. The data also includes hundreds of "before and after" satellite images of villages throughout Darfur, as well as additional details about when the villages were destroyed. This data also confirms that most villages were destroyed between 2003 and 2005, during the height of the brutal Sudanese government-backed campaign targeting civilians in Darfur.

Stay tuned for additional features in Crisis in Darfur, including a narrated flyover tour and a map of destroyed villages by year.

To access the Crisis in Darfur layers in Google Earth, visit Mapping Initiatives: Crisis in Darfur.

Learn more about the current situation in Sudan; view the press release announcing the update; and read about it in The Washington Post.

On the morning of July 15, 2009, Natalya Estemirova was abducted near her home in Grozny, Chechnya. As people on a nearby balcony heard her call for help, Estemirova was forced into a car. Her body was found a few hours later near a highway in the neighboring republic of Ingushetia.

Estemirova was a prominent human rights worker who for a decade had documented abuses, kidnappings, and killings for the Russian human rights group Memorial. She was the recipient of the first annual Anna Politkovskaya award, created by Reach all Women in War in honor of the murdered Russian journalist who courageously covered Chechnya for years. The award recognizes women who are defending human rights in zones of war and conflict, often at great personal risk.

Like many who have exposed human rights abuses in Chechnya, Estemirova's work met threats and condemnations from Chechen authorities. In March 2008, when Estemirova criticized a new law requiring Chechen women to wear head scarves, Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov summoned her to a personal meeting and threatened her. Frightened by the experience, Estemirova went abroad for several months. Then she returned.

The tragedy of her death was compounded by the subsequent closure of Memorial's office in Chechnya. Alexander Cherkasov, Memorial executive committee member, explained, "We have seen that the work Natasha was involved in, the work done by our colleagues in Chechnya -- documenting crimes committed by representatives of the authorities -- is fatally dangerous. We can't put them at risk." The Memorial office in Chechnya, which operated throughout the conflict, provided critical -- and oftentimes the only -- information about human rights abuses in the Russian republic.


Update: On Sunday, July 26, a suicide bomb killed six people outside a concert hall in Grozny as a crowd gathered for a performance. It was the second bombing in Grozny this month.

Since Estemirova's death two weeks ago, Memorial has accused President Kadyrov of involvement in her murder; Mr. Kadyrov has announced that he is suing the human rights group for slander.


For more information about Natalya Estemirova, her work, and the situation in Chechnya, please visit:

Memorial
Chechnya Advocacy
Human Rights Watch
The American Committee for Peace in the Caucuses

On July 22, 2009, the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague delivered the final ruling on the boundary dispute over Abyei, an oil rich region claimed by both north and south Sudan. In May 2008, fighting in Abyei between the north and south resulted in the displacement of 50,000 people and destroyed the town. Today's ruling by the Court determined that several areas -- including the Heglig oilfield -- were not part of Abyei. Inhabitants of areas that are within the newly established borders have the right to vote on a referendum in 2011 on whether they want to be permanently a part of north or south Sudan. Both Sudanese parties have agreed to abide by the Court's decision.

Learn more about the history of Abyei and South Sudan.

Explore World is Witness and read about the 2008 attack on Abyei.

Listen to our podcast interview with Sudan expert Roger Winter, who was in Abyei shortly after it was destroyed.

Tomorrow, July 11, marks the anniversary of the start of the 1995 genocide at Srebrenica. On this day, newly identified remains are reburied at the Srebrenica Potocari Memorial and Cemetery.

Faced with the seemingly impossible task to locate, recover, and identify so many missing people, the International Commission of Missing Persons (ICMP) has made steady progress, helping to identify 12,518 individuals in Bosnia, roughly half of whom are Srebrenica victims. Just this past May, forensic experts investigated a newly-discovered mass grave in Bosnia where they found 12 Srebrenica victims. About 70 mass graves around Srebrenica have been found since the war.

Watch eyewitness testimony from Bosnia, learn more about Srebrenica, and make your own personal pledge to take action against genocide.

This week, President Obama nominated Stephen Rapp to become ambassador at large for war crimes issues. As a prosecutor at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), Rapp led a landmark case against three Rwandan journalists charged with and found guilty of genocide, direct and public incitement to genocide, and other crimes. In 2006, Rapp left the ICTR to become the prosecutor of the Special Court for Sierra Leone. His nomination as ambassador awaits confirmation by the Senate.

Featured in a gallery of eyewitness testimonies in the Museum's new installation, From Memory to Action: Meeting the Challenge of Genocide, Stephen Rapp explains the importance of pursuing justice and his efforts to always put himself in the shoes of the victim. Watch his testimony and learn more about Rwanda and the ICTR.

Not long ago, a Chechen man named Nazir was visited by armed men in camouflage uniforms who gathered boards to start a bonfire alongside his home. Realizing what was about to happen, Nazir pleaded, "Why do I have to pay for the crimes of my relatives over whom I have no influence? But if this has been decided, I can't do anything about it. However, please listen to me. My roof touches my neighbor's roof. If you start burning my house, the fire will spread over to my neighbor's house." Considering the problem, the armed men patiently called a contractor to come separate the roofs before they set fire to Nazir's house. There was no doubt that they acted with deliberation and impunity.

Nazir's experience was not unique. A new Human Rights Watch report documents punitive house-burning, where families of insurgents have been intimidated and their homes burned down by local Chechen law enforcement personnel in targeted arson attacks across Chechnya.

In August 2008, the mayor of Grozny, Muslim Khuchiev, announced on television:

"In the future, if your relatives commit an act of evil, this evil will be brought upon you, your other family members and even your descendants... The evil perpetrated by your relatives from the woods will come back to your own houses and in the very near future every one [of you] will feel it on your own back."

Written in cooperation with the Russian human rights NGO Memorial, the report details these cases and confirms that they are perpetrated mainly by "law enforcement and security personnel under the de facto control of the republic's president, Ramzan Kadyrov."

The July 2009 report, "What Your Children Do Will Touch Upon You", is available at HRW's website here.